1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and a system for generating an edited picture print such as prints edited for an album print, and also to a recording medium for recording a program for the method.
2. Description of the Related Art
A printing service for generating a picture postcard, a creative calendar and the like, using a picture recorded by a customer, has been known. In such a service, a negative film or a print deposited by a customer is usually read by a scanner to digitize the picture image. After editing processing according to a customer's requirements has been carried out on the picture image, the picture image is printed. The editing processing herein referred to means determining a layout, trimming processing, and combining the picture image with an illustration or characters, for example. A customer's requirements regarding editing are usually conveyed to a service provider by pointing out an area to be trimmed using a drawing, or by selecting a desired layout or an illustration among samples prepared in advance.
Meanwhile, software for editing picture image data on a personal computer has been known. By taking in a picture image as digital image data using a medium such as a photo CD, the software can, for example, select a necessary picture image, position or trim the picture image, and combine the picture image with characters and an illustration.
In the printing service described above, an operator in a laboratory or the like carries out an actual editing operation, referring to a drawing a customer has drawn, for example. Therefore, it is not necessarily guaranteed that a print comes out as the customer expects. It is not rare that an area having been trimmed is not the area the customer wanted to trim, or that a position of a character string is slightly different from the position that a customer wants to place the character string at.
In the case where a large number of picture images positioned in a complex layout for an album are generated, the workload on the customer has been heavy, because detailed instructions should be provided to an operator. Furthermore, since the workload on the operator is naturally heavy in the case such as mentioned above, it is inevitable that the service provider raises the service charge.
If a customer orders a service provider to carry out a printing service by providing image data which have already been edited by the customer using the software described above for example, the intention of the customer is reliably conveyed. However, it is necessary to use a large capacity recording medium, since such high resolution image data that they can be printed out by both the service provider and the customer should be exchanged.
Nevertheless, a large capacity recording medium such as an MO disc or a ZIP disc is costly compared with a floppy disc and the like, and it is not preferable to put the cost on the service charge. Moreover, such a large capacity recording medium is far less prevalent among general households than a floppy disc. Therefore, imposing restrictions on a medium may hinder spreading of the service.